WP3 Economics by Dylan Patterson

Introduction

patte664 — 2025-03-24 03:21:42 UTC

Why Michigan State

patte664 — 2025-03-24 03:27:31 UTC

I've always been a massive sports fan and lover of sports environments. When searching for schools my junior year of high school I quickly realized there were no schools nearby that had the atmosphere I was looking for. I applied to lots of Big Ten schools but knew deep down that MSU is where I belonged.

Why Economics?

patte664 — 2025-03-24 03:28:48 UTC

Growing up I idolized my dad and my dad works for BNP Paribas as a credit trader. Seeing the high pace environment he worked in and just how thrilling Wall Street was, I wanted to major in something that gave me the best chance to have the same feeling at work.

What is economics?

patte664 — 2025-03-24 03:30:52 UTC

Economics, contrary to popular belief, isn't just about the stock market and Wall Street. Economics is the study of how people make decisions with scarce resources. Basically, just how people make decisions about important things.

The Nitty Gritty

patte664 — 2025-03-24 03:36:28 UTC

Getting an economics degree from MSU means earning 120 credits (MSU.edu). These credits aren't just economics classes, they are writing, biology, and humanities classes as well. This means that an economics degree teaches you extremely important day to day knowledge that isn't only economics based.

Different careers

patte664 — 2025-03-24 03:41:35 UTC

Graduating with an economics degree means that there are many different career fields you can choose from. According to the Bureau of Labor statistics the most popular jobs are economists, budget analysts, and actuaries (bls.gov). All these jobs are extremely competitive to get, and all compensate fairly.

Which career is right for me?

patte664 — 2025-03-24 03:45:38 UTC

The purpose of this project is to find the career that is right for me after I graduate with an economics degree. After exploring the many options I've realized that a lot of the skills that I'm learning can be translated to the different career fields.

MSU Economic Related Clubs

patte664 — 2025-03-24 03:49:41 UTC

One of the biggest upsides of going to a Big Ten school like MSU is the amount of extra curricular resources your offered. MSU has many clubs and organizations that will not only help me devlop my hard skills, but my soft skills that can be translated across many career fields.

Economics Club

patte664 — 2025-03-24 03:53:19 UTC

The Economics Club is obviously the first club that I would join. It would help me learn more about my overall major, and also connect me with people who are economics majors that I can consult with. It's main goal is to develop your economic skills while simultaneously networking (Campuslabs.com)

Student Investment Association

patte664 — 2025-03-24 03:55:29 UTC

The Student Investment Association helps given students like me, hands on experience at managing and investing money (campuslabs.com). While this isn't directly related to economics, it would help me practice handling money because that will be apart of my future job.

Finance Association

patte664 — 2025-03-24 04:01:08 UTC

The Finance Association will help me learn more about the finance industry and the financial world (campuslabs.com). While economics does cover a lot of financial topics, it does lack some depth in these topics. This association would help fill in some info on these topics.

Global Sales Leadership Society

patte664 — 2025-03-24 04:05:25 UTC

Some of the career fields that employ economics students are sales jobs. By joining the sales society I would be able to develop skills that I would use in a sales job (campuslabs.com).

Professional Organizations-American Economic Association

patte664 — 2025-03-24 04:09:10 UTC

The American Economic Association aims to provide research and information on the ever changing economics world to any and all economists (aeaweb.org). By gaining membership, I would be able to discover and discuss all things economics. This would help me polish my skills and knowledge that I could use in the workforce.

National Association for Business Economics

patte664 — 2025-03-24 04:13:35 UTC

The purpose of this association is to provide professional development to all economists and business related professionals (nabe.com). This would help me further improve all my economic skills along with grow my network to allow for future job opportunities to be more abundant.

World Economics Assocation

patte664 — 2025-03-24 04:16:57 UTC

The World Economics Association aims to do everything that the American Economic Association does, but only on a global scale (worldeconomicaddociation.org). This would not only help my economic skills, but also help me expand my network to all corners of the globe. By creating a larger network and marketing myself, I could set myself up for gret job opportunities.

My Interview

patte664 — 2025-03-24 04:27:11 UTC

SVP of League Economics

patte664 — 2025-03-26 19:52:39 UTC

A lot of financial jobs are about making trades and sales with a big focus on being the middle man in between buyers and sellers. This is very similar to how the MLB league economist works. He said, "We work with the clubs to execute and approve transactions" (Morgan 0:34). This effectively means that he is the middle man in between the clubs and the players when making contracts or trades.

My Interviewee

patte664 — 2025-04-03 18:15:02 UTC

For my interview I decided to interview my dad. My dad has worked in the financial industry for over 24 years. He has held positions at Merril Lynch, UBS, Imperial Capital, and now currently works for BNP Paribas. I chose to interview my dad because while he has only worked as a credit salesman, he knows a lot about all types of financial jobs. He also knows how the financial world works, and what hard and soft skills you have to develop when your in college.

Pre Interview

patte664 — 2025-04-03 18:17:32 UTC

Before my interview I decided to ask my dad a lot of the required questions. This is because I felt that those questions would give me the best chance of getting thoughtful and helpful responses from my dad.

Post Interview

patte664 — 2025-04-03 18:20:16 UTC

After my interview I listened to the whole thing over again and it was a fantastic decision. The answers my dad gave me to the questions I asked were extremely helpful in helping me understand the types of skills and communication I would need in any financial job.

Works Cited

patte664 — 2025-04-03 18:37:25 UTC

Reflection

patte664 — 2025-04-03 23:58:01 UTC